Numerical analysis of wet separation of particles by density differences

TL;DR

This paper presents a numerical analysis of wet particle separation based on density differences, using coupled DEM and SPH methods to simulate the separation process of particles in a liquid.

Contribution

It introduces a coupled DEM-SPH simulation approach for analyzing wet particle separation by density, which is novel in its detailed numerical modeling.

Findings

Separation efficiency varies with particle density differences.

Simulations show clear separation of particles based on density.

Method can predict separation outcomes for different mixtures.

Abstract

Wet particle separation is widely used in mineral processing and plastic recycling to separate mixtures of particulate materials into further usable fractions due to density differences. This work presents efforts aiming to numerically analyze the wet separation of particles with different densities. In the current study the discrete element method (DEM) is used for the solid phase while the smoothed particle hydrodynamics (SPH) is used for modeling of the liquid phase. The two phases are coupled by the use of a volume averaging technique. In the current study, simulations of spherical particle separation were performed. In these simulations, a set of generated particles with two different densities is dropped into a rectangular container filled with liquid. The results of simulations with two different mixtures of particles demonstrated how separation depends on the densities of particles.